Gauntlet vs TCG Archivist
Price, ratings, monetisation and update history for both apps, side by side — with what reviewers say about each.
Gauntlet
This app helps Magic: The Gathering players track game lives, build and customize decks, and record game history. It offers detailed stats for players and decks, supports multiple players, and includes a powerful hand simulator.
- Life tracking for up to 6 players
- Deck building and importing
- Game history and stats
- Hand simulator
- Deck customization with card art
- Deck organization with folders
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Gauntlet is the most feature packed Magic: The Gathering utility app available. It’s a life tracker, deck builder and record keeper of your games. THE BEST LIFE TRACKER: • Select your deck and the decks your opponents are playing. Player tiles will be updated with the cover art of each deck. • Save the results when the game is over. Select a winner, and each player will have their career and deck stats updated immediately. • Full support for up to 6 players with custom life totals, and a turn randomizer to determine who plays first. • Other features include 21 unique tile colours, 15 unique counters, rolling D6, and a game timer. THE BEST MOBILE DECK BUILDER: • Brew on the go or import your decks from other deck building sites. • Customize your deck with art from any card in the multiverse. • Pick a format and your deck screen adapts to show things like your commander or your signature spell. • Bling out the cards in your deck with foils. • Shuffle up and draw an opening 7 with a powerful hand simulator. • Stay ahead of your competition with deck list data. View your mana curve, pip breakdown, and more. • Export your deck lists as text, or share a link to your profile on social media. • Keep your decks organized with folders, and sort them by name, games played, wins, and format. YOUR GAME HISTORY IN DETAIL: • Every game is saved making it easy to go through previous games and see who played, who won, and which decks came to battle. • Track wins and losses for each deck, and see how your career wins and losses change over time. • Follow your friends to stay up-to-date with their latest brews, deck performance, and game history.
TCG Archivist
Digitize and manage your Magic: The Gathering card collection effortlessly. Scan cards instantly, track their values, and locate any card in your storage. Keep your entire collection accessible anywhere.
- Digitize card collection
- Scan cards instantly
- Track card values
- Locate cards in storage
- Manage entire collection
- Accessible anywhere
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TCG Archivist is the ultimate collection management tool for Magic: The Gathering players. We believe sorting your collection is the wrong approach. Sorting is time consuming, impossible to maintain, and never actually gives you a clear picture of what you own. TCG Archivist is built around a better system. One that the world's most efficient warehouses and retailers have used for decades. Scan your cards into labeled storage locations. No sorting required. When you need a card search the app, find the location, and have it in your hand in under a minute. Your entire collection becomes fully searchable, filterable, and always up to date. Know exactly what you own. Track your collection value in real time. Build decks from cards you actually have. Find any card in seconds. For players with larger collections the CSC100 hardware scanner makes building your digital catalog dramatically faster, but any camera will get you started today. Your collection. Always searchable. Always in reach. Terms of Use : https://www.apple.com/legal/internet-services/itunes/dev/stdeula/
Screenshots
Verdict
The clearest difference is rating: Gauntlet at 4.9 against TCG Archivist's 4.2. Gauntlet also leads on in-app purchases (none vs 1) and review sentiment (83% vs 55%). On price, update cadence, ads and device support there is nothing between them.
Scored on Price · Rating · Positive reviews · Number of ratings · Update frequency · Ads · In-app purchases · Monetization · Best chart rank · Devices · Requires iOS
Both are free to download. TCG Archivist sells 1 in-app purchase, starting at $4.99 per month. Gauntlet asks for nothing beyond the download.
Gauntlet holds the better App Store score, 4.9 against 4.2. That said, the two scores are not equally well evidenced: Gauntlet has 309 ratings behind it against 46, so its average is the more settled of the two. Written reviews point the same way: 83% of Gauntlet's written reviews are positive against 55% of TCG Archivist's.
Gauntlet ships an update weekly, TCG Archivist every 10 days. Both last shipped on October 25, 2026.
| Parameter | Gauntlet | TCG Archivist |
|---|---|---|
| Price | Free | Free |
| Rating | 4.9 (309 ratings) — better | 4.2 (46 ratings) |
| Positive reviews | 83.3% of reviews — better | 54.5% of reviews |
| Number of ratings | 309 — better | 46 |
| Update frequency | Weekly — better | Every 10 days |
| Ads | No | No |
| In-app purchases | No — better | Yes |
| Monetization | Free — better | Free with in-app purchases |
| Devices | iPhone, iPad | iPhone, iPod |
| Requires iOS | 16.4 | 15.5 — better |
| Further details — not scored | ||
| Size | 18 MB | 486 MB |
| Age rating | 4+ | 12+ |
| Developer | Scott Campbell | TCG Archivist LLC |
Customer experience
Gauntlet
TCG Archivist
Bugs and requests
Gauntlet
Reported bugs
5 issues- Developers have seemingly given up (according to one review)
- App ruined for jailbroken phones (iOS 14 and up)
- Board scrolls every time life or counters are moved
- Does not track win-rate for the deck not shown as primary in a match
- App is very small on iPad Pro
Requested features
19 requests- Scan cars to make adding decks easier
- More precise search engine
- Faster card loading times
- Display card prices
- Scan cards in deck building
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- Add Android support
- Add tournament bracket functionality
- Deeper stat tracking
- Leave notes about each deck
- Leave notes about individual cards
- In-app purchases for donations
- Add play test cards
- Better layout for exporting decks to text
- Feature to track win/loss ratios without starting a game
- Option for locking board scrolling
- Android release (mentioned as desired)
- Manual change of player names when playing 'against yourself'
- Add friends who don’t use the app to games
- Add full deck lists
TCG Archivist
Not enough reviews yet to summarise bugs or requests.
In-app purchases
Gauntlet
No in-app purchases
TCG Archivist
- Monthly Sub$4.991 Month








